BROOKSVILLE - One of Nature Coast Technical High School's former assistant principals is coming back to lead the county’s only magnet school.

Toni Ann Noyes, who currently serves as principal at West Hernando Middle School, has been tapped for the position.

An eight-member committee of Nature Coast staffers, district level employees and community members made “an overwhelming recommendation” for Noyes, superintendent Wayne Alexander said.

“I think she’ll be diplomatic and I think she possesses strong instructional leadership skills,” Alexander said. “I think she’s the right fit for the next wave and evolution of the school.”

Noyes served as an assistant principal at Nature Coast when it opened in 2004 and stayed until 2007, when she took a job as principal at Eastside Elementary. She held that post for a year before moving to West Hernando in 2008.

Noyes was picked from five finalists, all but four of them from within the district. A sixth - Carmine Rufa, an assistant principal under Noyes at West Hernando - withdrew his name this week.

Noyes couldn’t immediately be reached for comment Thursday.

Alexander said the district will now advertise to fill the empty top spot at West Hernando.

Sonya Jackson, formerly the district’s executive director of school services, had been tapped by superintendent Wayne Alexander to take over at Nature Coast this year. She would have replaced Margaret “Tizzy” Schoelles, who was reassigned to Fox Chapel Middle School. But Jackson applied to be the district’s second in command and was selected by Alexander for the job last month.

Among the finalists was Joy Green, who’d served as assistant principal at Nature Coast since 2006 and was assigned to an assistant principal post at Powell Middle School in Spring Hill.

- Tony Marrero, Times Staff Writer